by Dwight Cathcart | Oct 22, 2016 | Coming to terms with the past, Generational Divide, Reparations, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Walking wounded
We will get to the place where the President, the Congress, the courts, and the people of the US will acknowledge the fact that the nation has abused gay people. They will apologize for it, and then they’ll pay reparations. Because this is what Americans do. But this...
by Dwight Cathcart | Oct 1, 2016 | Anger, Coming to terms with the past, Gay kid, Gay literature, Generational Divide, Middlebrow Queer, Sexuality
In 1957, when we were students at a school in Tennessee (I was eighteen), students understood that it was against the law to engage in same-sex sex. You could be arrested, tried, and convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for a felony. What I think we were more...
by Dwight Cathcart | Sep 22, 2016 | AIDS, Anger, Courage, Fighting Back, Memory, Queer, Sexuality
Rachel Maddow, last night: “Are the demonstrators free to leave [the area of confrontation]?” The NBC News reporter in Charlotte, NC, Tammy Leitner, “Absolutely. They are free to leave. They are choosing to stay here and engage with the riot police.” Well, no. If you...
by Dwight Cathcart | Sep 5, 2016 | Courage, Courage, Fighting Back, Larry Kramer
At the Olympic Games in 1968 in Mexico City Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who had won the gold and bronze medals in the 100 meter track event, raised their clenched fists during the US national anthem. Everybody understood them to be giving the Black Power salute....
by Dwight Cathcart | Aug 24, 2016 | AIDS, Anger, Gay literature, Winter Rain, Writing
Winter Rain is a story of kindness, of grief, of a person’s not being able to tell for certain what he or she is or what has happened, and yet it’s a story of a person’s need to go on. This is a book about people who live tough lives. Respect has to be paid. It is a...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jul 29, 2016 | Assimilation, Celebration, Hillary Rodham Clinton, SCOTUS
That’s what she said. And so, my friends, it is with humility, determination, and boundless confidence in Ameria’s promise, that I accept your nomination for president of the United States. —Hillary Clinton, Acceptance Speech, the Democratic National...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jul 26, 2016 | Celebration, Fighting Back, Freeing yourself of it, Hillary Rodham Clinton, The future, Victory
I don’t know of anything so deeply moving as to be here, now, in front of the TV, at 5:46 in the afternoon on July 26, 2016, watching the roll call of states as the assembled delegates from the Democratic Party in the United States cast their votes, one state after...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 26, 2016 | Assimilation, Barack Obama, Books, Celebration, Coming to terms with the past, Don't Tell Me to Wait, Fighting Back, Gay Pride, Stonewall National Monument, Victory
Monday, tomorrow, is the forty-seventh anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, and today is the forty-sixth Gay Pride Parade in New York. Two-and-a-half million people watched last year’s parade, and organizers expect at least that many today. Click here for information...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 18, 2016 | Assimilation, Fighting Back, Marriage
#TwoMenKissing
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 13, 2016 | Courage, Courage, Fighting Back, Orlando massacre, The future, Transgender, Walking wounded
It was one of those surpassingly beautiful scenes in late spring in New England—the sun gone now, the sky at dusk beyond the buildings still glowing white, and the people, residents of Boston, slowing down in crossing Copley Square and joining the group of men and...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 11, 2016 | AIDS, Celebration, Ceremonies, Charles Howard, Courage, Freedom, Gay literature, Sexuality, Stonewall Riots
Derek is an actor, in Maine for summer stock in the summer of 1984, when a young gay man named Bernie Mallett was murdered by three homophobic teenagers. Bernie’s murder changes the lives of LGBTQ people in Maine—the town is called Cardiff—and makes just about...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 10, 2016 | Assimilation, Barack Obama, Celebration, Coming out, Coming to terms with the past, Fighting Back, Freeing yourself of it, Queer, SCOTUS, Sexuality, The future, The Gay Revolution, Transgender
Last night, Rachel Maddow interviewed Elizabeth Warren. Warren endorsed Hillary Clinton for the Presidency and, toward the end of her comments, spoke of Clinton’s character and what she has shown through the long primary fight. (counter 8:00) She won because she’s a...
by Dwight Cathcart | Jun 7, 2016 | Coming to terms with the past, Courage, Generational Divide, The future
It is 10:43 in the evening. C and I spent the day doing errands—the hardware store for screws for hooks in the utility closet in the back stairs—and chores, principally laundry. It is a warm evening, all the windows are open, and the neighborhood is quiet. After I...
by Dwight Cathcart | May 19, 2016 | AIDS, Anger, Barack Obama, Coming to terms with the past, Courage, Fighting, Frank Kameny, Generational Divide, London April 23 2016
I want to look at the issue of fighting versus negotiating. What has brought us our success? In the last couple of weeks, the President has brought this up in London and then again later at Howard. Over last weekend, a person I know wrote me, questioning whether I was...
by Dwight Cathcart | May 12, 2016 | Barack Obama, Celebration, Fighting, Fighting Back, SCOTUS, The effects of bigotry, Transgender
Amazing things have been happening in the last four days. Last week, the Department of Justice delivered a five-day ultimatum to the Governor and State of North Carolina and the University of North Carolina, and others, which fell due Monday. Instead of giving in and...
by Dwight Cathcart | May 2, 2016 | Barack Obama, DOMA & DADT, London April 23 2016, SCOTUS
Friday, April 23, President Obama spoke with a group of 500 youth leaders at a town hall meeting in London, and among the students who spoke were a number who raised questions that involved the relationship between principles and tactics in social movements like LGBTQ...
